Author's Note: hello! I know, it's been like, 5 months since I've posted anything, I know. Blergh. But here's a new chapter, and it's 1000 words longer than the last one, so hopefully that makes up for the lateness. That's 200 words extra for each month, lol. Anyway, guys, hopefully you enjoy this chapter. Loves for all! Huggles!

- LA Knight

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ChapterTwo
Accidentally in Love

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Was he following her?

Dylan didn't know, and didn't care. Let him follow her if he wanted. As long as he kept his mouth shut, she didn't care. She didn't care about anything—not the cold flakes of snow stinging her cheeks, the wind that had kicked up to bite into her through her leather coat, not even the dull ache in her knee as she slogged through the snow. No, she didn't care about anything except getting home and hiding in her room like a child. Immature? Possibly. But she couldn't gather enough energy to care about maturity while Nuada's words crashed around inside her head.

I suppose it was...inevitable, no matter how revolting or ludicrous the idea. Ludicrous, he'd said. Ludicrous that he could ever be attracted to her. I could never love you.Never. Or care for her. Love her. Why had she let herself fall in love with him? Why had she been stupid enough to think he saw her as anything but…but baggage? An object, instead of a person? How had she forgotten his disgust for her?

She stumbled over a deep drift and nearly went down in the snow. Only a jarring step with her bad leg that sent needles of red-hot agony through her knee up and down all the way to her hip and ankle saved her from face-planting in the snow.

Stupid to come out so far. Stupid to make the long walk to the faerie metal playground when it could start snowing any minute—and had. No wonder the walk was so difficult. The salted, shoveled walkways had been snowed over while she'd been acting like a lovesick girl with a faerie prince beyond her wildest dreams…

His lips, so warm and velvet soft, yet deliciously firm against her own. His arms around her, strong as steel, gentle as a lover. She'd been safe, sheltered, for those few precious moments when Nuada had bent his head and kissed her as if he cared for her.

As if he loved her.

The word sent pain drilling through her chest, opening a wide, black chasm in her chest that threatened to crack her in half. You must see how ridiculous such a thing would be. She'd been stupid. Stupid. Hadn't her life taught her anything? Of course the one man she loved, a brave and honorable and—usually—kind man like Nuada, could never love someone like her. Could never…It would be like falling in love with my horse. That was all she was to him—an animal. Not even a person, but an animal.

A sob caught in her throat. She swallowed it, tasting salt, and hugged herself, huddling within the confines of her leather coat for warmth. She hadn't been cold when she'd walked out to the playground with Nuada. Hadn't felt the biting November chill of a New York night while swinging, talking, hurling snowballs. Where had the warmth gone?

Humans do not know how to love. Humans cannot love.

All around her was the soft swish-swish of snowflakes dropping like slow icy tears to the white ground, and the muffled crunching of her own footsteps. The thudding heartbeat in her ears and the occasional sniffle as she fought back the tears her anger had temporarily quelled, but were now springing to her eyes like tiny diamond blades to cut tracks down her numbing cheeks.

Nuada wasn't following her. He was done with her. Of course he was. Dylan tried to resign herself to that fact. Resign herself to the idea that Nuada despised her now because she'd dared to fall in love with him, dared to reciprocate a kiss that he had initiated. Whatever fondness he'd felt for her was gone now.

The tears were hot when they spilled down her cheeks. She dashed them away with the back of her hand before they froze to her cheeks, but they kept coming, scalding her cool skin. Scrubbing furiously at them, Dylan tripped through another heavy drift and felt to the snow.

Suddenly it was all too much: the issues with Lisa, Dylan's own suspension from work for a week, the horror of the pending evaluation, the voice-mails from her sister upon her return from Faerie, the situation with Bethmoora and faerie politics, and now Nuada's rejection. She couldn't take it anymore. Shivers racked her body as she hung her head and drew up her stiff knees, ignoring the pain shooting through her leg from the vicious cold. Dylan pressed her forehead against the tops of her updrawn knees. Hunching her shoulders, the cold seeping through the denim of her jeans and her leather coat, she stopped fighting…and simply cried.

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It took Nuada minutes to throw off the shock—agonizing minutes, where each second seemed to tick by like an hour. Snow began to fall in silent, sharp flurries of white all around him. He could only stare after Dylan in shock, long after she'd disappeared down the path.

She loved him?

That was impossible. Human beings couldn't love. The children of Adam were incapable of it. He'd seen evidence of this, irrefutable proof, throughout his centuries of exile and even before. Dylan's own childhood—a little girl locked away in the dark to be starved, tortured, beaten, and raped—was proof of this. Perhaps Dylan thought she loved him, but she couldn't really. No human could love.

No human is capable of honor, compassion, or courage, yet she is. A snide voice in his head mocked him. Nuada gritted his teeth, forcing himself to ignore the words echoing in his skull. The voice continued, You know she is different. You know she is loyal, brave, kind, gentle. You know all this, yet think she cannot love? If you cut her, does she not bleed? If you break her heart, does she not weep? The words continued, relentless, as Nuada finally managed to stir himself enough to move, to follow after the mortal woman who'd sworn him her fealty. Is it she who has no heart, Silverlance…or is it you?

Shut up, he snarled, striding down the path. Irritation simmered in his veins. He would catch up to Dylan, the prince decided, and demand an explanation. How had she come by the ludicrous idea that she was in love with him? What had she been thinking, behaving so inappropriately as to kiss him? He was a prince of the blood, by the Fates, not some stable-lad. And by what right did she vent her spurned anger at him for stating nothing but the truth? She was human, and he was an Elf. There could be nothing between them. And it did not hurt to think those words.

The anger smoldered in the pit of his belly now as he continued through the woods, ignoring the snow falling more and more thickly around him. She would not make him feel guilty for speaking naught but the truth. She would not make him feel…whatever this clutching, choking, grasping ache throbbing in his chest was. It tasted of regret, yet that was impossible. Regret for what? Rejecting a mortal's advances? What else was he to do?

His righteous fury was in full sway when he found her huddled, weeping, in the snow.

Outrage melted away the moment he caught sight of the trembling black shape on the path. Snowflakes caught the moonlight, diamonds against the shadow of her hair, against the smooth darkness of her jacket. How long had she been sitting in the snow like that? Seconds? Minutes?

The weeping that poured like grief from her mouth felt like fists; every sob hit him low in the belly. He hadn't meant to hurt her like this.

He hadn't meant to make her cry.

Nuada didn't quite know what he meant to do as he quietly approached her. Instinct, and that clutching ache in his chest, drove him to kneel next to her and slip his arms around her, uncaring of the snow. She was so small, he thought. Slender as a willow wand, he could feel the fragile glass of her bones beneath her skin. Feel the shivers ripping through her, and the hurricane force of her sobs. He could taste the pain and sorrow like ashes emanating from her like some toxic miasma. She shoved against him. He didn't let go. How could he? After a single moment where the tension in her body seemed sharp enough to cut him open, Dylan relaxed and turned her face into Nuada's shirt, still weeping.

"Dylan," Nuada murmured, then trailed off. What could he say? He'd spoken nothing but the truth.

"I thought…" She hiccupped. Her fingers tangled in the loose fabric of his sleeve. For some reason, Nuada suddenly felt claustrophobic. As if heat and closeness and something sharp were pressing against him, all around him, smothering him. He gritted his teeth and forced himself to ignore the feeling. Hoarsely Dylan added, "I thought you thought I was a different."

He sighed. "You are different," he said softly. His fingers were cold; that was why, he told himself, he slipped them beneath the silken tangles of her curly hair where it lay against the back of her jacket. "Where your people are vicious and cruel, heartless, you are…you're kind. Gentle. Brave. But…"

"But still no better than an animal," she whispered, and there was so much bitterness in those words he could taste it, wormwood and hurt. "Is that all I am to you, Nuada? A pet?"

Another sigh. "That isn't what I meant." He hesitated, then added, "Dylan. What you feel…it isn't love. Humans don't know how to—"

She jerked away from him, stumbling to her feet and backing away, shaking her head. The betrayal in her eyes was like a flame; he felt that dark fire catch at something within him and set it alight, and he couldn't have stopped the pain of that burning if he'd tried. The look in her eyes…it was too close to the look Nuala had slashed him with the day he'd gone into exile. That look of simple, broken, utter betrayal. Instinct had Nuada reaching for her, but he jerked his hand back when Dylan actually cringed from him.

"Dylan—"

"Do you have any idea what this feels like?" She whispered. "Do you know how it feels when I have to listen to you tell me that I can't discern what's real and what isn't? You, of all people…I know how to love, Your Highness. You've walked my mind before, you know I do."

Nuada shook his head, refusing to dwell on the memories of being in Dylan's mind—a mind so unlike any human mind he'd ever walked before. "Dylan, I have seen what humans are capable of. Your nature is destructive and cruel. Love is foreign to…" He trailed off when she thrust out her hand to him. When he didn't move, she took two sharp steps forward. He realized she was shaking.

"Fine," Dylan said in a voice that trembled. "If you don't believe me, then look for yourself. Prove that I'm crazy. Prove that I don't know what I'm feeling." He still didn't move, too stunned by what she was asking to form a thought. "Prove it!" She yelled. "Prove it! You can't tell me I don't know what love is, you can't tell me these things, you can't do this to me, then back down when I tell you to back it up!" Before he could blink, she was there, right in front of him, filling his senses—sight and scent and heat and touch—tangling her slender fingers with his. "Do it! Look into my mind and tell me that what I'm feeling isn't love. Tell me I don't feel like I'm dying inside every time I look at you because you'll never love me back, but I can't just walk away from you! Tell me this isn't killing me! Don't just stand there, do it!"

He didn't know why, what made him do it—the tears rolling like liquid crystal down her cheeks, reminding him too strongly of nights in the underground sanctuary where the darkness turned her into a terrified child again; the way the lips he'd so recently, so foolishly, so treacherously tasted were trembling; or maybe the despair warring with a plea in rainswept blue eyes—but Nuada tightened his grip on her hand, closed his eyes, and slid into Dylan's mind.

This time it was different. He hadn't been prepared, or he would've walked more gingerly through her thoughts, picking his way with care, instead of striding in as if it were familiar territory. He nearly staggered under the wash of warmth, and sadness, and an ache in Dylan that resonated with something within Nuada. Shock jolted through him when he realized something that should've been impossible—she'd been shielding this from him, just as she'd shielded him from the darkness of her memories, that night he'd walked through her mind. How else had he missed it? How could he have missed…this?

Velvet warmth stroking inside his mind, a caress that left him breathless. Grief, a hopelessness that made him grit his teeth. How was it that a human could feel such anguish? Yet that sorrow pulsed in her thoughts, a festering wound at the center of her. And self-loathing; why? What was there about her to loathe? Yet she despised herself…He felt the truth brush past him. With a flick of power, he caught her thought before she could censor it.

He didn't love her. Couldn't love her, she thought. Could never love her as she loved him. Despised her. He'd been her friend, her only friend that she could and had shared anything and everything with…and now he'd rejected her, because he'd kissed her and she'd dared to respond. Rejected her, as so many of those she'd loved had rejected her.

Nuada realized he'd been a fool not to see this before. How had he missed any of this? And how could he deny that she loved, when he could feel the rich golden purity of it washing over him like a summer sea, like crystalline starlight? It staggered him, the fey intensity of her emotions. How did a human feel so deeply? And how could anyone, human or fae, love him like this, when his own family could not? Irrevocably, unconditionally?

And he also understood at last why it hurt her for him to say she didn't feel what she claimed to feel, didn't know what she claimed to know. How many times as a child had people, adults she was supposed to be able to trust, told her that? Lied to her? Brutalized her instincts, her self-knowledge, until she didn't know who to trust? Didn't know what was real and what wasn't?

"Oh, gods, I'm sorry," he whispered as he continued to drown in her. He didn't break his grip on her hand; couldn't. He'd never felt this from anyone before, except…but Nuada forced himself not to think of Yukihime. Instead, golden eyes locked with tear-filled blue. "I didn't know." It hurt, like a taloned hand squeezing his heart, when she said nothing, only wept harder. At last he released her to cup her face with both hands, wiping away the tears so they didn't freeze to her delicate skin. A bit of magic warmed her air-cooled cheeks. Gentle brushes of his thumbs across her cheeks swept away fresh tears as he murmured, "I didn't know. I did not realize…I'm sorry."

Then a mad impulse seemed to seize him. She was so small, so fragile standing in the snow, looking so lost. So heartbroken. He felt like a monster, seeing that grief in her eyes. Grief he had put there. And she was shivering, too. Nuada drew her close, tried to warm her with a bit of magic and the heat of his body. Dylan gazed up at him, biting her bottom lip.

Love. She loved him. How…how?

Whatever madness had possessed him and urged him to take her in his arms now crept through his veins like molten fire, smoldering beneath his skin as his eyes roved over Dylan's tear-streaked face. Most women despised how they looked while weeping. Red noses, red-rimmed eyes. Dylan merely looked pale. Crushed, like a broken flower left to wilt on the ground. Tears glimmered in her eyes and spiked her dark lashes. Her eyes…so blue, so fey…damn her eyes.

His thumb swept across her cheek again. That insane fire clutched at him, forced his gaze to track the line of tears down the curve of her cheek to the corner of her trembling mouth. Her lips, pale sweet pink…he'd touched them earlier tonight, and they'd been soft as satin beneath his fingertips.

Gods, what was wrong with him?

"Dylan—"

"Don't," she whispered. "Please." Her voice broke. So did his heart, a little. Why did she look so frightened, so desperate? "Don't play with me."

Stung by her plea, he said, "I would never…why would you…I wouldn't toy with you, Dylan."

She pressed her lips together until they were nearly bloodless. Her fingers twisted in the black silk of his tunic. "Then why are you doing this?" Her entire body yearned toward him. His fingers flexed against her cheeks, and Nuada had to force himself not to caress her skin, not to bury his fingers in her hair. Why? Why did these urges whisper to him, tempt him? "Touching me like this? Why are you looking at me like that?" Dylan whispered. "Don't look at me like that."

"How do I look at you?" Nuada murmured. He leaned toward her, suddenly needing to recapture the closeness they'd shared at the playground. Honor demanded he comfort her when something he had done made tears sting her eyes. Honor, and…and…but it couldn't be…"Tell me."

Dylan shook her head. "No," she gasped. "No. Stop it. Please…" She squeezed her eyes shut. No, Nuada thought. No, that wasn't right. The madness, the insanity surging through his blood like liquid lightning, wanted to see the brilliant moonlit blue of her eyes.

"Look at me," he commanded. Dylan made a small sound, a sound of bone-deep pain. Gently, pleading, Nuada whispered, "Look at me, Dylan."

Her gaze when it fell upon him was like a blow. It struck him, nearly felled him. It seized him by the throat and refused to relinquish its savage grip. Whatever lunacy she'd infected him with began to burn, a wicked and inescapable hellfire. No, he groaned silently. No, gods, please. No…dammit, it cannot be…it can't…I can't…and yet…

Gentle hands cleansing and tending his wounds; a lullaby, slightly out of tune, whispered in his ear in a dream; snowballs flying through the air; hot chocolate in the dead of night; her voice, the silver velvet of it, as it unfolded brilliant stories of princesses under sleeping curses and savage barbarian warriors; slender arms around his neck as she comforted him in the wake of brutal nightmares. Dark curls like silk shadows, eyes like the moon over Bethmoora, scarred lips curved up in a welcoming smile. Mortal. Human. Rescuer. One whom he owed. One who tried to be more than she ever could for his people. One who loved him more than any other ever had, save one.

Dylan.

And he…he couldn't…he could not…but, he realized with a sick jolt that nearly drove him to his knees, he did.

Suddenly knowing himself damned, he closed his eyes, tunneled his fingers into Dylan's exquisite silken hair, and captured her soft mouth with his own. She gasped, her entire body taut as a bowstring, and she shoved at his chest for a second—a split-second eternity of rejection—before sliding her hands around his neck. The edges of her hands caressed his jaw, her fingertips whispered against the back of his neck, and she pressed close.

Nuada tasted salt, tears. They stung his lips, burned his tongue. She was crying. No, no, that was all wrong. She shouldn't have been crying any longer. Why did she weep? He wanted so much to make it better. Why did she weep? Was this not what she wanted?

I love you, she'd told him. Dylan loved him. So why did his kiss bring tears to her eyes? Why was there a sharp ache in his chest? It felt almost as if he held something precious cradled in his hands, something he knew was already beginning to vanish into the mists of the past. But why?

"Don't cry," Nuada whispered against her lips. "Don't cry, Dylan. Please don't cry."

"Why?" She whispered back.

He wanted to tell her, wanted to explain…but what would he have said? Even as his lips brushed hers again, gossamer promise, he knew this could go nowhere. Nuada could never give himself to Dylan as she wished. He could never allow himself to love her, even if he were capable of it. And he was capable, wasn't he? Because she'd been right—he thought she was different, because she was.

"Why are you doing this to me?" Dylan whispered, her voice saturated with pain. No, he didn't want her to be in pain. Hadn't she suffered enough for him? Nearly dying for his sake so many times, and now this…Her voice broke when she asked, "Why are you doing this?"

Closing his eyes, he breathed against her lips, "Would you believe me if I said that for once, I don't know the answer?" He shuddered, feeling the armored walls of ice collapsing around him as he allowed himself to confess, "Tonight, I shall play the fool. Tonight I shall abandon reason and give into madness. And when dawn comes, a fool will I be still, for I will still have no answer for you. I still won't know why I cannot turn you away a second time." His knuckles grazed the thick scar slashing down her cheek. A look that might have been pain crossed her features. "Dylan, I cannot love you. I cannot let myself. It goes against everything I believe in."

When she drew a strangled breath, Nuada went very still. Two diamond drops fell from her lashes to splash hotly against his hands where they cradled her face. Every word threatened to transform into a sob when she whispered, "Nuada, please don't—"

"I should not love you," he interrupted. "I shouldn't. Humans…steal everything, don't they?" The hurt in her eyes raked him. He pressed his mouth to hers, swallowing the first of the soft, newborn sobs. He broke away, only to press in again, gentle but intent. Somehow, between kisses, Nuada whispered, "You steal my courage. You steal my honor. You steal my resolve. You steal my self-control. You steal my very breath with what I've found in your heart." He shuddered. The words seemed to tear from his throat when he groaned, "You steal my heart and soul."

Stunned, she blinked at him. This time, when he leaned in to kiss her, he covered her mouth with his and didn't pull back again. Her lips were so soft, soft and inexperienced as he moved his mouth over them. When he touched his tongue to them, traced the lush contours of those petal-soft lips, she made a sound that was almost a whimper and parted those sweet lips for him. Only then did he get a true tasting, the first long slow deep drinking of her, and he felt her almost swoon into his arms. His tongue delved into her mouth, exploring, coaxing her response. This was wrong, so wrong, but he didn't care any longer. Not after learning how she felt about him. Not after realizing he was damned for his own treacherous heart.

Instead, he lost himself in her taste, in her sweetness. If he was going to Hell, he might as well do it thoroughly. And he never, ever wanted to hurt her, break her heart, as he had at the faerie metal playground. Because along with the golden pleasure of her love in his mind, he'd felt her pain, the agony of his rejection. He hadn't known he could do that to her. He never wanted her to feel such grief again.

Perhaps it was the aftermath of what he'd felt in her mind, the sorrow and the love. Perhaps it was the heady intoxication of her kisses, her taste. Or perhaps it was simply that he had no self-control, no armor left. Then again, perhaps he'd simply gone mad.

Whatever it was, Prince Nuada Silverlance of Bethmoora whispered, "Dylan…I'm sorry. I'm so sorry, Dylan, I am so very sorry, but I…I love you."

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Author's Note: Hello again! So I didn't expect that. This chapter sort of grew organically (okay, no sort of, it just did). I had no idea where this was going until the words were on my word-processor. I only knew where it wasn't going—along the lines of this dream I had where Nuada caught up to Dylan in her cottage, they kissed and stuff, and ended up having sex. I knew that wasn't happening. So yeah…new timeline is very different from the original. Of course, Nuada in the original universe has never actually read Dylan's mind to feel the full depth of her love for him. That might shatter/shake up/humble anyone, yeah? So what do you guys think is gonna happen next? Reviews are love!